Rehabilitation following ACL injury or an ACL Reconstruction (ACLR) is an essential part of a full recovery and can span over several months. The rehabilitation process can be subdivided into various statuses/classes/levels, with each level having its own instructions, directions, rehabilitative guidelines and functional goals. During the rehabilitation process, the physiotherapist exercises their best professional judgment to determine the current state of recovery and devise appropriate treatment plan based on the same. As an individual's progress is variable, this treatment plan must be individualized for optimal return to activity and hence, accurate determination of the recovery progress and a status/class/level of recovery become crucial.
As such, systems utilizing visual Electromyographic (EMG) feedback are being used during rehabilitation processes. Patients have experienced improvement in muscle function following use of EMG feedback. However, currently marketed visual biofeedback systems provide minimal information to either the clinician or patient about the recovery progress and a status/class/level of recovery. The feedback that is most commonly provided by these systems is sensing strength of muscular effort and providing output corresponding to the sensed strength.
Evaluation of progress in a rehabilitation therapy program is problematic in part because of the small increments in the improvement of individuals. Current rehabilitation evaluation instruments and methods are not best adopted for the desired function. Often the rehabilitation evaluation instruments and methods are too crude and reliance has to be placed substantially upon what is observed by rehabilitation clinicians. Relying extensively upon observations of the rehabilitation clinicians makes the outcome prone to human errors. In any event, it has not been possible to determine a recovery progress and a status/class/level of recovery of a knee joint of a patient's limb from Anterior Cruciate Ligament injury in real time.
In view of this problem, there remains a need to provide a method and a system for real-time visualisation and determination of a recovery progress and a status/class/level of recovery of a knee joint of a patient's limb from ACL injury.